subject: Nutritional Labels Aren't What They're Cracked Up To Be [print this page] Nutritional Labels Aren't What They're Cracked Up To Be
Nutritional labels are not what they appear to be anymore, especially not in today's revenue-driven world. Integrity is gone and profit-making has stepped up to take its place. These days when you eat something you have to ask yourself if what you're eating is actually what you're eating? From genetic engineering to deceptive food labeling practices, the food industry is running amok and doing what it wants, when it wants and at our expense.
When you go into the store, with hopes of making a nutritionally sound purchase you have to prepare for battle. You have to put on your armor, maintain the eye of the tiger and pay no mind to the colorful, smiling, emotional stimulating distractions zooming in on you. For food corporations you are prey and they are going into their bag of tricks and using the best of the best of their predatory tactics to conquer you and make you submit to their will.
So you have to know that, in the world of food, nothing is as it seems anymore and food just isn't food. Trying to interpret nutritional labels has become a mind game, and in some instances a mission impossible. Food corporations have gone to extreme lengths to disguise ingredients to win our patronage. Its almost like we're in a dream state where things seem familiar, but are somehow different so we can't exactly identify them.
Take for instance, sugar. Now this ingredient has more aliases than James Bond. Seriously, there are at least 75 of them. To name of few, it's been listed as brown sugar, corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, dextrose, fructose, glucose, galactose, malt, lactose, maltodextrin, molasses, rice syrup, sucrose, panocha, invert sugar and dozens more names. Meanwhile, despite all the word play, food producers claim that sugar, specifically high fructose corn syrup, is harmless.
Though you have to ask, if that's the case why not be honest about what it is when labeling food packages? Why all the word games? After all, don't consumers that purchase from these companies and maintain their existence have a right to know what they're spending their money on and subsequently feeding themselves?
